The invention relates to an artificial joint, in particular to an artificial hip joint, comprising a bearing shell which has a concave spherical bearing surface A with center M.sub.S, and with a joint ball which has a convex spherical bearing surface B with center M.sub.K, which as a rule is rotationally symmetrically arranged with respect to a mounting axis D in the direction of the femur neck of an artificial hip joint shaft.
Artificial joints require pairings of the materials of the bearing bodies which move relative to one another which have good emergency running properties. The classical starting point in the combination of materials thus consists in pairing dissimilar partners. Thus relatively soft bearing shells of polyethylene are combined with hard joint heads of metal or ceramics and, in the early days of the artificial hip joints, metallic materials of differing hardness and wear resistance were combined with one another. In spite of all efforts, it was never possible to completely eliminate the wear of the partners with these material combinations. With polyethylene, for instance, an abrasion takes place in the hip joint through which the bearing surface is recessed by approx. 0.2 mm yearly in the direction of the principal force. Even with metallic surfaces wear arises due to point loads and micro-weldings at the surfaces which--once they have begun--very rapidly affect the entire surface of engagement.